SEEKING NATIONALITY THE JUDICIAL ODYSSEY OF APPLICANTS hence be able to register his children administratively.60 In addition, some people do not even know that they can file a lawsuit to register their children, nor where such a petition can be submitted, and they are also unaware that such a lawsuit can be filed without the need to be legally represented by an attorney and avoid the fear of having to pay lawyers high fees. The same applies to those who can acquire the nationality through filing a nationality lawsuit based on jus soli grounds if they meet the legal conditions. Plus, the vast majority of persons might not know the actual costs of registration and nationality lawsuits’ fees and think that they are very expensive, a matter which might discourage them from filing such lawsuits. Wrong Advices In another case, the Mukhtar was asked by the parent to complete the registration of their child with the administration. Yet, he delayed to do so within the one-year period awaiting the religious court proof of marriage, and consequently, the child became stateless. Further, this obliges the parents to resort to court and bearing the long proceedings and extra cost. there are a number of Mukhtars who seem to be unaware of the laws in force as they provide wrong advice or carry out wrong procedures impeding the person concerned from reaching the appropriate solution To fill the gap of the lack of civic education and availability of official information, Lebanese people heavily rely on hearsay when they need to be informed about a legal matter which generally if followed turns to have negative consequences. The findings of this study show that many stateless persons, particularly parents of unregistered children, were either unaware of the laws and regulation. When resorting to other unofficial sources, often they obtain wrong or inaccurate or incomplete information or advise about the procedures that ended in their children stateless. Wrong Advice Provided by Mukhtars One of the roles of Mukhtars61 is regulating the relation between the individuals and the state and are key actors in civil status procedures, and a source of information about the laws and regulations. In reality, there are a number of Mukhtars who seem to be unaware of the laws in force as they provide wrong advice or carry out wrong procedures impeding the person concerned from reaching the appropriate solution or delaying and complicating the procedures. For example, in one case, the Mukhtar advised a father of eight children to file a nationality lawsuit based on proof of kinship mentioning only six children, assuring the father that the remaining children will be easier to obtain another civil ruling to register her later, ignoring the fact of the double action, cost and time consuming. Wrong Advice Provided by Attorneys In a number of cases, lawyers, contrary to Articles 9 and 10 of the Code of Ethics of the Law Profession,62 provided their clients with wrong or inaccurate advice. In one case related to execution of the naturalization decree by a stateless person, the lawyer advised his client not to execute the decree and wait until another naturalization decree is issued. Hence, the client lost the opportunity to end his statelessness and his children, born after the issuance of the decree remained without registration when if the decree was executed, his children would not be stateless too. In another case of a naturalized Syrian man who wanted to register his marriage conducted in Syria after the execution of the naturalization decree, the lawyer advised him to file a lawsuit to rectify his marital status rather than advising him to obtain a Shari’a Court ruling validating his marriage and then executing the registration of his marriage administratively. The lawsuit lasted more than 4 years and during that period, his newborn child was stateless. In another registration lawsuit, the lawyer advised his client to include the cousin as his child to acquire with his children the Lebanese nationality knowing that the DNA test shall reveal the truth. As a matter of fact, when the court requested the DNA test result came out showing non-matching, the lawsuit was suspended and the client’s child lost his chance to acquire the Lebanese nationality. In a different case involving a child born to a Lebanese mother and a father whose nationality is “under-study”, the lawyer advised the father to register the child as an “illegitimate child” in the mother’s civil records, ignoring the fact that the child is legitimate and the documents show a marriage contract and prove of marriage and kinship ruled by the Shari’a Court. In another registration example, the lawyer informed the parents that the DNA test shall cost them $1,800 when in fact it cost $600. The high cost of the DNA test discouraged the parents from filing the registration lawsuit. SEEKING NATIONALITY | PART 3 FRONTIERS RIGHTS Wrong Advice by Religious Persons In many situations, individuals turn to the Muslim Sheiks to obtain advice in civil status events matters that are sometimes wrong or inaccurate. For example, a Ja’afari court told a Lebanese man married to an unregistered woman that they cannot validate his marriage when there are no legal barriers to validate such marriages. Some Muslim Sheiks, moreover, conduct marriages disregarding whether or not all conditions are met. This leads either complicate and delay the validation of the marriage in religious courts later or not being validated at all making it impossible to register the marriage and the registration of the children born within this marriage. 70